-
WSUS is nothing more than a house of cards waiting to be pulled down. What is really stunning, is Microsoft is stripping away all the failsafes to protect OS and system data that have been developed over the years of use. After reading this ‘support overview’ my teams view was it meant the death of Microsoft as a major software vendor and support company. That might be a tad overblown, but I understand their anger on dealing with this rolling train wreck, It’s exhausting. There are more chapters still to play out here, but as I have said before, this is strictly a failure of leadership by the CEO and the board that backs him. No matter what happens to the current CEO, this will not end well for Microsoft, the damage done in broken promises and failed projects is too great.
1 user thanked author for this post.
-
-
-
-
Noel, you get to the heart of issue. The whole windows as a service is looking more and more like a pretext for deep data harvesting. Even if Microsoft went into this with the best of intentions, the massive data breaches, the active and open operations by intelligence agency’s of various governments should have been reason enough to change, if not pull back on their new policy. I refuse to believe that Microsoft did not get a ‘heads up’, not with Woody’s fine reporting on the issue. And now they make themselves a prime target with a huge ‘steal me’ with their waas policy. Madness, there is no other word for it.
1 user thanked author for this post.
-
I think Ed Bott could make a decent case for windows 10, if not for the failure of execution of said plan by the current CEO and the board who backs him. In my opinion the problem is not windows 10 and the software and hardware that supports it. Windows 10 is actually a good OS. But it has been undercut by the very people who are supporting it for reasons of their own. This is a failure of leadership, plain and simple. Giving how many systems run on windows as their backbone, this question of leadership must be answered quickly. Also, while not talked about openly, there are important national security aspects than can not be overlooked. If Microsoft does not answer these questions, then it’s future is in serious jeopardy.
3 users thanked author for this post.
-
My father in law bricked his HP laptop. Spent close to two weeks searching for the OEM disk. Finally, I gave him my 2013 HP 17 inch notebook loaded with windows 7sp1. To see the relief in his eyes was payment enough. Microsoft has no idea what they have done to these people. PS. A week later I found both his product key and OEM disk. Sometimes, it pays not to throw anything away. And yes, he is still using my old notebook, my mother in law is using his 18 inch win 7 upgraded to sp1. They are both very happy.
9 users thanked author for this post.
-
Do not lay this on ch100 or any system administrator. The choice of any OS is based on flexibility, scale, and above all cost. These systems are expected to last at least a decade(with upgrades of course) and be the back bone of corporate communications. Say what you will about Microsoft, but they provided robust support for their customer no matter their size for years. Microsoft earned their respect and loyalty the hard way. Which makes Microsoft’s current decisions and practices so dismaying and shocking. If you ask me why, I can not explain it at all.
-
-
-
A couple of months ago ch100 laid out Microsoft’s transition plan to the cloud. While difficult, if done right (beefed up QA for the OS and middle ware, support for small business) this could have been a major winner for the CEO at every level for years to come. Instead, we see Nadella make one bone headed move after another. It’s like he is looking for sinkholes to drive into. The single major mistake Nadella made as CEO was to disconnect windows consumer division from the rest of the corporation. Former CEO Bill Gates understood to sell windows, business leaders needed to use his products. In other words, a gateway. Do not underestimate the impact the consumer version had on the CEOs. Understanding is always the single biggest factor in buying any product. And now, for the sake of what, ego? Nadella has thrown Microsoft’s single major advantage away. Intel faced the same problem a couple a years ago. They ‘resigned’ their CEO and changed their entire business model overnight. To call Microsoft’s collective and cumulative actions to date stupid, is a gross understatement.
3 users thanked author for this post.
-
Microsoft’s real problem is that they are running scared. F.U.D. (fear, uncertainty, doubt) destroys more companies from within than any single issue. The real crunch for MS is coming in the next 18 months. EOL for windows 7 licenses will force CEOs and their CTO(sysadmins) to make some real hard choices. While the easy choice would to upgrade to win 10, the current CEO has made it clear that their data would be treated very differently than it is now.(There is a question on how MS will allow companies to extend their current licenses.) Under those conditions, a CEO would look real hard at the alternatives. The unanswered question is, is Microsoft listening to their concerns. I have my doubts.
4 users thanked author for this post.
-
This more like evolution in action than anything else. Sooner or later a solution, to what we considered the basics of computing, would push the bulk of people away from the retail PC market. Steve Jobs saw this coming in the late 80’s, but the technology was not mature enough for the consumer market. It’s not Bill Gates was wrong, in his belief that desktop would become a hub. He like most, could not see the speed of growth and maturity on the hardware side of the industry. Unlike Apple, Microsoft’s response is seen as more knee jerk and lacking a clear vision. As a boss, I believe both are correct in the long term. PCs on the hardware side are increasing in power and complexity and are far more reliable than even a decade ago. Heck, mobile computing has entered the realm of science fiction. We don’t even understand what smart phones are doing to our civil socities on a macro scale. Regardless, this will even out, and the PC retail market will make a comeback. In what form that is, is unknown.
3 users thanked author for this post.
-
Whispers, only whispers that the board is feeling the heat about Microsoft. Even if the core of the stories coming out of MS are true, and I have my doubts. Then we may be seeing the beginning of what happened to Ma Bell, IBM, DIC etc. Microsoft is a second generation tech company, so this in its self is not unusual, and happens to companies in mid life. I suspect that MS shareholders are not a happy group of campers right about now.
1 user thanked author for this post.
-
Author
